


On the Intentional Use of the First Person Plural

by thelogicalghost



Category: The Eagle | The Eagle of the Ninth (2011)
Genre: Banter, Feelings Realization, Fluff, Gay Panic, M/M, Pining, Pre-Slash, mentions of cultural homophobia, really just sappy sappy fluff time here
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-18 08:09:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21841012
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thelogicalghost/pseuds/thelogicalghost
Summary: [Yuletide fill] Post-movie, pre-slash. Esca takes Marcus to the market. Marcus untangles his feelings.
Relationships: Marcus Flavius Aquila/Esca Mac Cunoval
Comments: 28
Kudos: 207
Collections: Yuletide 2019





	On the Intentional Use of the First Person Plural

**Author's Note:**

  * For [dr_zook](https://archiveofourown.org/users/dr_zook/gifts).



“Let us go to the market,” Esca said one day, unprompted.

“Is there something you need?” Marcus asked.

“I have never been to one of your great markets. There is one here, no?” Esca said, which didn’t answer the question.

Well, Marcus supposed he owed Esca at least a modicum of patience. He guessed that either Esca wanted Marcus’ help for something too delicate to ask outright, or he was just being his usual enigmatic self and would explain eventually. And Marcus _had_ said that Esca could decide what they did next.

The Londinium market was indeed far larger and grander than any in the smaller northern towns and was ringed with permanent shops of all kinds. Marcus had seen larger during his time in the army, but even for him this was sizable. He thought, as they walked in, that one could buy anything that could be bought in the whole of Roman Britain at that market, if one had the coin.

His next thought was, _but for one thing which is already mine_. He dismissed the thought sharply the moment it arose. Esca was a freeman now, and while legally freemen were not equal to citizens, there was nothing but equality between the two of them. He had no reason to think of Esca as his in any way except as a friend. Obviously.

Generally Esca was efficient when dealing with matters of money. He knew what he wanted, sought the appropriate vendor, and knew what he would pay for a thing before any offer was made. Marcus secretly enjoyed watching salesmen fail to crack Esca’s resolve and finally acquiesce to a reasonable price.

Today, however, Esca seemed uncertain as he drifted from stall to stall. In rather atypical behavior, Esca actually struck up short conversations with several merchants, seemingly unrelated to purchasing actual items.

"Is it a very difficult trade to learn?" Esca asked a potter while inspecting a plain cup.

"It takes time. Practice. Talent helps. Most of all, you need the right hands." The potter reached out to touch Esca's hand. Marcus felt a muscle in his arm twitch at the forwardness of the gesture and wondered why Esca would let this strange man paw at him. He almost missed the shake of the potter's head. "No, you would have a hard time." 

Marcus felt an instinctive need to close the distance between himself and Esca. He wasn't sure why. The potter was hardly a threat. But the way he'd touched Esca, and then insulted him, as if Esca couldn't make fantastic pots if he put his mind to it -

The potter glanced at Marcus, back to Esca, and then down to Marcus' hand. "Now, your friend has potter's hands. But not the right temperament, I think," he added with a frown, glancing back at Esca.

"We don't need any earthenware," Marcus said with finality. He touched Esca's shoulder with a slight pressure, a gesture to leave. Esca gave the potter a look that Marcus couldn't see to decipher, but he didn't like the potter's answering half-smile. 

It wasn't the only stall where Esca asked strange questions. Marcus tried his best to quell the strange tension that rose each time. Perhaps he was simply still wary from so many months in hostile territory, he thought to himself. He was too accustomed to seeing every stranger as a potential threat.

He forced himself to calm down and simply watch Esca drift from table to table. He wondered what it was that Esca sought without seeming to know what it was he wanted. Perhaps, he thought, Esca was searching for something. Like a present. Though, who would Esca wish to honor with a gift?

(A girl? No, surely not, Marcus would know if Esca had been paying attention to a woman. Wouldn’t he? Why did that question bother him? Esca deserved to find someone who would make him happy. It would just be surprisingly, if there was a girl, and Marcus didn’t know. Not that there was any particular reason Marcus should know.)

Marcus shushed his suddenly turbulent thoughts as Esca turned to him. One of Esca’s hands rested lightly on the top of a sealed urn of honey.

“You like honey,” Esca said.

Marcus felt that there was a question in that, not about his like of honey, but he couldn’t quite fathom it. “Who wouldn’t?” he replied lightly.

“We could keep bees. Bee-keeping isn’t difficult, from what I’ve heard,” Esca continued. “Then there is honey and wax both to sell. If you do not eat it all.” There was a smile playing in his eyes as he said it.

And oh, suddenly Marcus understood, and the breath left his lungs. He drew it back in as quick as he could, covering with a small laugh. “If I eat it all? I would have to race you to the hives just to get a taste.”

Esca smiled properly then. “At least we could sell the wax.”

With “we” in his ears, Marcus followed Esca through the market all morning with a lightness in his chest he refused to dwell on. They weren’t shopping for items but for plans and ideas. They shopped for a future, interrupted only by gentle teasing.

At a great jar of olives, “I have always wondered how these are grown.”

“Not in these parts, it’s too cold. Far south there are great groves of trees.”

At a stack of hides, “Uncle Aquilla always praised my leatherwork.”

“But you can’t stand the smell of the tanner’s. You’d give it up in a week.”

At a woodcarver’s, “You like to whittle.”

“In the time it would take me to turn out a piece such as this, you would have abandoned me from boredom.”

(Was there a “never” in his answering smile, or was it only in Marcus’ imagination?)

Eventually they paused in their quest to gather bites of wonderfully-smelling foodstuffs from several stalls before settling on a low bench outside of a tavern. A young woman came out to serve them wine. Her features were British but every facet of her dress was Roman, from the way she wore her hair to the fragrance that wafted suggestively from where she had dripped it on her skin.

Marcus paid her polite enough attention, slightly bemused by her flirtatious manner towards them. It had been a long time since he had received such attention. In Calleva, everyone had known of his injury and lack of prospects, and his dour manner during his convalescence had been less than inviting. There had been that one time in the North, but it had so quickly turned sour that he studiously ignored all further female glances for the rest of their time there. The serving woman’s open looks, her hand brushing his arm as she reached across the table, were almost alien.

When she’d gone back inside the tavern, Esca tilted his head and said, “She likes you.”

“She’s good at her work,” Marcus replied. “No doubt her smiles are good for her business.”

“She did not smile at the other patrons, or at me, the way she smiled at you,” Esca countered.

Marcus frowned at his friend. What was Esca implying? The tone of his voice was almost one of encouragement, as if Esca was saying, _go on_. But Marcus had no intention of flirting with the server. He had come here with Esca, after all –

Wait.

Marcus put his cup down, slowly, blinking. He reviewed his thoughts.

He had come here with Esca. Defensive when Esca spoke to other people, upset when they touched him. Scared at the idea that Esca might be interested in a girl. Relieved when Esca wanted to talk about their future. A beautiful woman had flirted with him and Marcus had reacted only with bemusement. Because he was here _with Esca_.

Oh no.

Marcus realized, with dawning terror, that he was deeply and unalterably in love with Esca, to the point where he had absolutely no interest in pursuing anyone else.

This was terrifying because Marcus could never, ever, tell Esca.

Relationships between men were commonplace in the heart of the Empire, but even in Rome they were falling out of popularity. On the edges of the world, it was hard to know where people stood on the issue without bringing it up directly. Some believed “Grecian proclivities” were frowned upon by their gods. Even in cultures that were more accepting, it was often thought of as unmanly or humiliating to be the “lesser” (or younger, or otherwise submissive) of the pair.

From what Marcus had seen of life in the Seal Tribe, relationships between men had not been accepted. He had no other reference point to know Esca’s opinion. He could ask, of course, but the thought of hearing Esca reject even the possibility of a relationship was devastating.

Clearly, Marcus would have to keep this newfound knowledge to himself, forever.

Suddenly, the brilliant spectrum of possible futures they had been discussing all morning turned dark. A future of unbearable, silent pining stretched out before him. Marcus could not bear to be parted from Esca, so he would watch, and want, and swallow his desire. Perhaps someday Esca would find a woman, and Marcus would watch them together, jealous and heartbroken.

Marcus was shaken from his thoughts when he realized Esca had said something, and he’d missed it. “Sorry, what?”

Esca snorted. “I was right. I said you had that look on your face, the one you get when you are thinking too hard about something.”

Marcus was suddenly gripped by the terror that Esca could read his thoughts. He dismissed the paranoia and tried to smile, grasping for something reasonable to excuse his distraction. “I was trying to estimate in my head, how much land we might need, and the costs.”

“What is there to worry over?” Esca shrugged slightly. “We’re not afraid of hard work. What we invest in, we will grow. Perhaps the bees will have to wait a few years.”

Marcus felt his heart thud uncomfortably in his chest. “You would tolerate my company for a few years without any sweetener?” he joked, hoping he was just imagining that his voice sounded strained.

Esca laughed. “I should be asking you.” Then he tilted his head slightly, and Marcus had the impression that Esca was looking right through him. “I will not run off with any pretty serving women.”

Marcus nearly choked on his wine. “I didn’t –”

Esca, the utter bastard, was smirking.

“I was just,” Marcus started, and then sighed. “Esca.”

“Stop fretting.” Esca stole a dried plum from Marcus’ meal. “Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it. Together.” He placed the date in his mouth and chewed, slowly, holding Marcus’ gaze with his own.

Marcus found himself echoing, “Together?” with far too much emotion in the word.

“As long as you want that,” Esca said simply.

 _Forever_ , Marcus thought, but bit his tongue. “You’ll get tired of an old, crippled Centurion.”

“Marcus,” Esca said in the tone of voice one uses to explain to a child that water is wet, “If that did not happen when you dragged me across every glen in the Highlands, it will never happen.”

A seed of hope bloomed in Marcus’ despondent heart. “I have not yet dragged you across every unclaimed farmhold in the Empire.”

Esca seemed to consider this. “Eventually your leg will start hurting. Then I can overpower you, tie to you a tree, and force you to pick one.”

“You wouldn’t.”

Esca raised his eyebrows in a silent, _wouldn’t I._

Marcus sighed. “Fine. Only the ones in Britain.”

“Not Spain?”

“… Do you want to live in Spain?”

“Don’t you?”

Marcus blinked several times. “I don’t want to make you leave your home.”

Esca looked at Marcus strangely, then, and made a small sound of frustration. “Marcus,” Esca said, again in that tone of explanation, “We do this together. Where we make a home, that will be my home.”

And finally, finally, Marcus understood what Esca was saying. What Esca had been trying to say with every word and action that day, talking and thinking of the future. What he had meant when he spoke of the serving girl, watching Marcus’ reaction.

And he realized that he wasn’t the only one who might be afraid to speak plainly.

It was too soon to speak of these things. Too public, here in front of this tavern in the market. But they had all the time in the world.

They would figure it out.

Together.

**Author's Note:**

> My first Yuletide ever, woo! I admit I had trouble because this is very much not my usual kind of fic but I hope this little pile of pining, denial and lovesickness for Marcus, some banter, tension and resolution, and domesticity fits the ask.


End file.
